Death and Dying Elisabeth Kübler-Ross is best known for her revolutionary book On Death and Dying. In this book, Elisabeth introduced her theory on the five stages of grief that indivuals experience as they face death (). These five stages include denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Denial is an individual’s first reaction. It acts, as a temporary defense mechanism with the person believing that the diagnosis could not possible be true. Once realizing that their denial cannot continue, the person becomes angry often asking “Why me?”. The third step involves bargaining. Often the indivuals tries to negotiate for an extension in exchange for a reform lifestyle or seek a compromise. As recognition begins to set in, they move into the fourth stage: depression. During this state, the indivuals may become silent and spend much of their time in morning often refusing visitors. Finally, comes acceptance. They embrace their or their loved ones mortality or inevitable future. Elisabeth would later expand this model to include forms of personal loss for example the death of a loved one or the end or a relationship and even minor losses like that of a pet. The five stages of grief are still widely used today to help people cope with death and loss.
Hospice Care Elisabeth’s work with the dying led her to
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She wrote several books including On Death and Dying, Life Lessons and On Life After Death. In her book, On Life After Death, Elisabeth mentions her first account with NDE came began with a woman named Mrs. Schwarz (). Declared dead, following forty-five minutes of resuscitation attempts, all hope was lost for Mrs. Schwarz. However, a miracle occurred and doctors were able to revive her. Mrs. Schwarz lived for another year-and-a-half before ultimately dying and during that time, she met with Elisabeth and presented her story to Elisabeth’s seminar class at the University of